In today’s “Director’s Take” blog post, developer Blizzard Entertainment announced that they will be running two tests to return 6v6 matchmaking back to their popular free-to-play hero shooter ‘Overwatch 2’. The first test will consist of the standard 2-2-2 role-queued matchmaking from the original Overwatch while the second test will be the classic 2-2-2 setup but with specific Overwatch 2 improvements. Lastly, expect some new game modes in the game’s current season to test similar ideas within the realm of the game’s current 5v5 matchmaking composition.
Have a gander below for more details on the upcoming tests (or click here to read the blog post in full). Overwatch 2 is currently in the middle of its 13th season and is available on PC, Xbox, PlayStation consoles, and the Nintendo Switch.
The team has been exploring our vision and development for these tests, and we’re happy to announce we will be running two different 6v6 tests in Season 14.
The first, launching a week into the season, will look a little different than the standard 2-2-2 role-queued from Overwatch. Part of this series of tests is to not only judge our player’s appetite for larger team sizes, but for us to explore different ways that we might implement a change without running into the same problems we had previously. With that in mind, our first test will be a variation of Open Queue, which we’re internally referring to as “Min 1, Max 3”: each team of 6 must have at least 1 of each role, and no more than 3.
There are a few different combinations here that you will be able to try, but this opens up many different team compositions that we haven’t seen before in Overwatch 2. You will be able to switch roles on the fly during a match as long as that switch doesn’t break the “Min 1, Max 3” limit.
Besides experimenting with a format that could be seen as a middle ground to Role Queue and Open Queue, this will also give us a look at how Overwatch 2 heroes, abilities, and updates work in a 6v6 environment before we expand to other types of tests.
The second 6v6 test, during Season 14 midcycle, will be the classic 2-2-2 composition but will incorporate some new principles we introduced with Overwatch 2 (like less CC and hero reworks).
The 6v6 tests will have their own card in Unranked alongside other modes, and they will not take the place of other types of game modes like seasonal events or Quick Play: Hacked. We’ll also be implementing a series of balance changes that will apply to these two test modes only. The power and survivability of tanks will go down in these 6v6 formats, and we’ll be taking a look at whether we need many of the passives that we’ve added in Overwatch 2.
We will be hosting two 5v5 format experiments in Season 13 that are also aimed at testing flexibility within this format, similarly to the 6v6 tests. We’re planning a Quick Play: Hacked coming soon, which we are calling “Limit 2”. This will be 5v5, with the maximum number of each role limited to two. This includes Tanks, but they will be tuned to Open Queue balance, meaning they will have less health. You can freely switch heroes and roles as long as the new role doesn’t already have two players.
Like the 6v6 limits tests, we’re trying to look at how the game in its current state works if players have more freedom with team compositions without making it full Open Queue.
For the Season 13 midcycle, we’re planning a special game mode currently codenamed “Kingmaker.” Like “Limit 2”, the maximum number of each role is limited to two – however, the player who is alone in their role gets a bonus! We will talk more about how the mode works in more detail closer to its launch, but like “Limit 2”, we’re exploring more freedom in 5v5 while enabling more types of compositions to succeed.
Quick Play: Hacked, “Limit 2”, and “Kingmaker” will provide an excellent benchmark and framework for us going into the 6v6 tests. We’re looking forward to seeing what statistics we can gather as you dive into these modes, alongside your feedback, which is one of our strongest data points!
